A Helping Hand
by Rowan Blackstone
Summary: Stan and Fiddleford both have their share of problems, but they're always there to help each other through them. Written for Weirdly Romantic Fiddlestan Day on tumblr.


Stan _had_ to sleep on the left side of the bed. It was something that had become ingrained on him during his years of living in his car, he would always sleep in the driver's seat; just in case something happened and he had to leave in a hurry. For a long time it hadn't really been an issue, he lived alone and slept in a bed that was barely big enough for himself and only arguably even had sides. When he and Fiddleford first began to share a bed, it had been such a long time since he'd even thought about it that it didn't even occur to Stan to sleep on one side over the other. He lay down on the right and fell asleep.

Then he had a nightmare, a pretty rough one. He jolted up and in his, still half-asleep panic, he moved toward the left side of the bed, which he instinctively associated with safety; only to find another person there, who his sleep-addled brain didn't recognize as Fiddleford. In his hurry to get away he toppled backward, rolled off the right side of the bed, and hit his head against the nightstand. All this ruckus woke up Fiddleford, who was very alarmed to see his lover sitting in the floor, clutching his head, and swearing a blue streak. When Stan, now fully awake and angry about this situation, explained that he hit his head, Fiddleford helped him stand up and pulled him into the bathroom to check his injury. To Fiddleford's relief, nothing appeared to be broken and Stan wasn't bleeding, though there was a bruise beginning to form on the left side of his forehead. When asked how he felt, Stan said that his head hurt a little, and Fiddleford insisted on going down to the kitchen and putting some ice on it. Partly this was a precaution, Fiddleford wanted to make sure Stan didn't have a concussion before either of them even thought about going back to bed, and partly it was because he wanted to know how all this had happened.

Sitting at the table, holding some ice wrapped in a hand towel to his head, Stan explained everything to Fiddleford; about the nightmare and his long forgotten sleeping habits. Stan said that he felt ridiculous about this whole situation, for reacting so strongly to a dumb dream, for forgetting something like that, and getting himself hurt because of it. Fiddleford wrapped an arm around Stan and reassured him gently that everything was fine, really. He was absolutely the last person who would ever judge Stan harshly for forgetting something, and the important thing was that he remembered now and they could try to make sure something like this didn't happen again. Stan smiled and wrapped his free arm around Fiddleford, returning the half-hug.

The two of them sat in amiable silence for a while, until Stan insisted that his head really didn't hurt anymore. When they went back to bed, Stan lay down on the left, where he would sleep from then on. For Fiddleford's part, it didn't really matter to him where he slept, he just liked sleeping next to Stan.

Sometime after they got together, Stan asked Fiddleford about the bandages on his arm. He had become concerned when he realized that he really couldn't recall a time when Fiddleford's arm hadn't been bandaged up. While it was most likely that whatever injury had needed the bandages was probably long ago healed, Stan was keenly aware that even old injuries can cause problems, especially if they hadn't been cared for properly in the first place. When, after thinking about it for a few minutes, Fiddleford admitted that he didn't really remember how long he'd had them or why he'd needed them, Stan suggested that maybe it might be time to take them off.

Fiddleford looked completely taken aback by the suggestion, as if it had never even occurred to him that they could come off. He agreed that Stan might be right about that, but he was awful nervous about the idea. He wasn't sure that he could do it. Stan reminded him that he didn't have to do it alone. Fiddleford just smiled and accepted the help.

Stan gathered together a few things he thought they might need and set up on the kitchen table. Fiddleford sat down in the chair next to Stan and stretched his, visibly shaking, arm out to him. Stan took hold of Fiddleford's hand and gently rubbed his thumb across the back of it while giving Fiddleford his assurances that everything was going to be alright. After a few minutes Fiddleford seemed to calm down, his shaking stopped, and he gave Stan the go-ahead to start. The process of cutting through the bandages to get them off took a while; the bandages were tougher than he expected and the safety scissors he was using were a little blunt(he didn't want to take the risk of accidentally poking or cutting Fiddleford with regular scissors), but he managed to cut through them and gingerly peel the bandages away from Fiddleford's arm.

The noticeable layer of filth and grime covering Fiddleford's arm where the bandages had been didn't surprise Stan(he had a bowl of warm water and some mild soap standing by), after all, those bandages had absorbed all kinds of elements over the years and they definitely restricted his ability to keep clean, when that had been an option. Stan held Fiddleford's arm over the bowl and poured a small handful of water over it, just enough to wet it slightly, and began to lather it up with the soap. Stan noticed that Fiddleford would wince slightly whenever he touched an area just a few inches below the wrist, and when he rinsed away the soap, it wasn't hard to see why. There was a patch of red, irritated skin on the upper part of Fiddleford's arm; Stan could only guess that the bandages had been wrapped too tight there and had rubbed the skin under them raw. Stan patted Fiddleford's arm dry with a hand towel and, tenderly, rubbed the irritated area with a little bit of ointment that he'd fished out of the first-aid kit.

Letting go of Fiddleford's hand for the first time since he'd started; Stan took the towel and wiped the excess ointment off of his fingers, and declaring that he was finished. Fiddleford pulled his arm back slowly and stared at it, seemingly unable to believe that it was actually bare for the first time in years. Then, Fiddleford unexpectedly let out a short, sharp laugh and just said that he'd have to get used to this.

From the very beginning, Stan had always insisted on cooking for the two of them. This suited Fiddleford just fine, he had never been much of a cook and he was terribly out of practice. However, in those early days, Stan's memory was still a little bit out of sorts and he couldn't really make much of anything other than pancakes. Fiddleford didn't really have a problem with that; hot food that was made for _him_ by someone who cared about him and wanted him to eat well was something that, for such a long time, he never imagined having again. He could very happily live the rest of his life on Stan's pancakes.

As time went on though, and Stan's memory grew more stable, Fiddleford encouraged him to experiment and try cooking other things, just for the experience. It was slow going; cooking, as it turns out, was a lot more complicated than most people thought and Stan had to re-learn a lot of things just to make relatively simple dishes. Things didn't go particularly well at first, but whenever Stan had a mishap in the kitchen Fiddleford was always there to help him clean up and offer some sympathetic support. After all, even cooks who hadn't had their memories erased could mix up baking powder and baking soda, and it wasn't Stan's fault that some recipes had a lot of abbreviations that were hard to remember, and really, what does _medium_ heat even mean?

But, with practice and sheer determination, Stan improved. There were fewer and fewer cooking projects that ended with a pep-talk from Fiddleford and Stan going to the pantry to get the pancake mix, and more that ended with the two of them sitting down to a good meal and enjoying Stan's accomplishment. While Fiddleford was pleased enough that Stan's cooking repertoire was expanding; what really made him happy was seeing the unabashed pride and confidence that Stan practically glowed with whenever he remembered a recipe and made it without any mistakes.

By the time they had been together for about a year and a half, Stan was a better cook than he had been before he lost his memory.

Fiddleford had a problem with showering. His knees just weren't as strong as the had been when he was young and standing in one place long enough to take a shower just proved to be more than they could handle. At first they were just stiff and sore when he got out of the shower; irritating, but really just one more ache in his creaky old body. Then one night they just gave out all together and he fell. Stan heard him fall and came rushing into the bathroom to make sure he was all right. Fiddleford wasn't hurt badly, just jarred a little and shaken up more than anything, but they both agreed that maybe he shouldn't use the shower anymore. He was lucky this time, but if he fell again he ran the risk of actually hurting himself.

This, however presented a new problem, because, as far a Fiddleford was concerned, taking a bath wasn't an option either. A few years back, when he had been living in a barely held together hovel in the junkyard, there had been a huge rainstorm. A hole had gotten knocked into the sheet metal he'd been using for a roof and water came pouring into the old tub that he'd been using for a bed...while he had been sleeping in it. He'd come very close to drowning in his sleep. Now, the idea of sitting in a tub full of water just filled him with dread.

For a while, Fiddleford gave up on proper bathing. He would wash his hands and face at the sink a couple of times a day and shampoo his hair, also at the sink, every other day. Stan didn't want to see this go on; for one thing, he was sure it couldn't be hygienic. For another, it killed him to see Fiddleford driven to behaviors that reminded him more than a little of his years on the road, out of fear. So Stan came up with an idea; since the bathtub was easily big enough to fit two people, why didn't he get in the bath with Fiddleford? The two of them could bathe together and that way Stan would be right there to make sure that Fiddleford was safe. Fiddleford reluctantly agreed that such an arrangement might work and they decided to give it a shot.

The first few nights of shared bathing could have gone better. They involved a lot of Fiddleford clinging to Stan in fright and Stan having to take charge and make sure both of them got washed. Over the course of the next few months, though, the water seemed to bother Fiddleford less and less each night. He seemed to gradually be growing more accustomed to the water and less worried that the water might rise up any moment and drown him. He didn't attach himself to Stan the moment they got in the tub anymore and he'd even, once or twice, started little, playful splash fights with Stan.

Indeed, Fiddleford seemed to be cured of his terror of the bath. Though, by now, the two of them had become kind of used to bathing together and neither of them really saw any reason why they should stop.

Stan and Fiddleford had an unspoken agreement. Every night, when they went to bed, they made sure that the last thing they said to each other before sleep overtook them was, 'I love you'. They had both lived long lives filled with a lot of uncertainty, loneliness, and hurt. They both knew how important it was to remind someone that you cared about how much they meant to you.


End file.
